Social Security Enacted

The threat of old-age unemployment and dependency, long a
subject of public discussion, led to passage of the Social Security
Act of 1935, assuring modest retirement allowances at the age of
65 to many kinds of workers. An insurance fund for this purpose
was built up by contributions from workers and employers. The
states, with funds provided by a compulsory federal payroll tax,
were to administer unemployment compensation for active workers
of all ages. By 1938, every state had some form of unemployment
insurance.

Recurrent droughts in the 1930s led to the enactment of an
Omnibus Flood Control Bill, which provided for a
series of large
reservoirs and power dams and thousands of smaller dams. To
combat soil erosion, particularly on the plains of the midwest
resulting from misuse of the nation's abundant natural resources, a
gigantic program of soil conservation was undertaken, including
the planting of trees. Other important work involved the
elimination of stream pollution; the creation of fish, game, and bird
sanctuaries; the conservation of coal, petroleum, shale, gas, sodium,
and helium deposits; the closure of certain grazing lands to
homestead entries; and a vast increase in national forests.

Of all these undertakings, the one of greatest future
importance was perhaps the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA),
which became a comprehensive laboratory for social and economic
experimentation. In addition to major dams in three states along
the Tennessee River, a number of tributary dams were
constructed. These were used not only for improving navigation,
flood control, and nitrate production, but also for generating
electric power. The government constructed some 8,000
kilometers of transmission lines and sold power to nearby communities
at rates sufficiently low to permit widespread consumption. Rural
electrification was financed by a TVA subsidiary. The TVA also
withdrew marginal lands from cultivation, helped farmers find
new farmland, conducted agricultural experiments, particularly in
the use of phosphate fertilizer, and promoted public health and
recreational facilities.